An Indian Air Force search team has hit upon what could be vital clues in a nine-month-old mid-air supersonic MiG-29 crash mystery. It has found body parts including a foot thumb, back bone believed to be those of the missing pilot Sqn Ldr DS Tomar and burnt wreckage of the MIG-29 that had hit the 16,000-foot-high glacier in the Chokhang mountain range and crashed after it lost radio contact with the Adampur air base in Jalandhar at 8.30 pm on October 18, 2011.

It took the IAF nine months and 13 days to find the MiG-29 wreckage sources revealed. The IAF team, led by IAF group captain and comprising rock climbers and mountaineers and Ladakh Scouts today returned from the glacier with â€œa human foot thumb and a back bone and other burnt piecesâ€ retrieved from the debris from the melted glacier, which are believed to be that of the missing pilot and the crashed plane.

The team is searching for the black box that would help ascertain the time and cause of the crash, sources said.

The IAF has brought the wreckage to the base camp at Thirot where the team is camping. The pieces and human limbs and bones will be sent for DNA testing and forensic examination in its forensic lab in New Delhi before making a final statement to unravel the mystery shrouding the MiG-29 crash, sources said.

The team has communicated the details of its recovery from the spot to the IAF western command, Delhi and refused to share this new information. â€œIt will be after the DNA testing and forensic examination that the IAF will make a final statement, sources told The Tribune.

The IAF team has demanded a helicopter from the western air-command tomorrow to fly back the recovered wreckage.